Letting Go of Las Cruces
Angry faces circled around me, so close I choked on the sour stench of beer on their breath. My heart pounded. I knew that being seen hanging out with Keith, who took complete pride in being gay, would end up putting a target on me. Taking the shortcut home by the bar had been a bad idea, and now here was the proof.
A hand reached out and yanked on one of my thick brown dreadlocks, making me hiss in pain and jump back into someone else, who shoved me forward and laughed when I stumbled.
“The little fag doesn’t want you messing up his beautiful hair, Jason,” one of the men sniggered.
Another one laughed. “He’s all screwed up. Look at him, man. Not only is he a flamer, but have you ever seen a white guy with snake-lookin’ hair?”
My eyes darted left and right, looking for a way out. The darkened parking lot looked forbidding, but I was willing to take my chances –it was better than being beaten up behind a bar.
“Not so fast, pretty boy,” another growled, grabbing the back of my shirt as I tried to run. The man knocked me down, digging one knee into my back and wrenching my arm behind me.
Tiny rocks dug into my face and my shoulder screamed in protest. I struggled against the guy, trying to get up, but the man pinning me down only pulled my arm harder, making me cry out.
“Shut up.” One of the others reached down and punched me, making the black night seem bright for a split second. I squeezed my eyes shut, catching sight of the fist drawing back again, and braced myself for the punch.
I woke up flailing, my legs tangling in the navy blue bedsheets. My heart hammered against my chest, as if I’d just finished running a marathon. I sat up and rubbed my face briskly with both hands, shoving dreads out of my way. It was three-thirty in the morning, according to my cell phone, and I doubted I’d be able to fall asleep again.
I threw the covers back and picked up the thick green robe my mom had given me for Christmas three years ago, throwing it over my bare torso and padding into the kitchen of my small apartment. Ignoring the dishes in the sink, I reached for the box of Swiss Miss next to the crackers, hoping hot chocolate could lull me back to sleep.
I leaned against the speckled white counter as I sipped the thick drink, wrapping my fingers around it and enjoying the quickly fading warmth. The men’s faces loomed in my mind’s eye abruptly and I shuddered, spilling some of the hot chocolate.
I sighed. “One year since I moved, and I still have nightmares,” I muttered.
A woman walking out of the bar had heard the men jeering as I screamed and called the police sometime after the second punch. The arrest of the three men would have been enough to make me feel better, if it hadn’t been for the cop’s comment to his partner about calling an ambulance for the “hurt queer” on the asphalt. That was enough for me—I was tired of Las Cruces’ hostility towards me, no matter how much I had tried insisting I was straight. I had packed my bags a few days later once my shoulder felt better, and headed for Charlottesville a few months earlier than the University of Virginia’s move-in date.
I sighed and poured the last fourth of my hot chocolate down the drain, moving the plastic bowls out of the way. I didn’t think I could fall asleep again easily—I was too afraid I’d just fall back into the dream.
I wrapped the robe around myself tightly, swiped my keys from the ratty low coffee table in the living room and stepped outside, locking the door behind me. I picked out another gold key on the keychain and shoved it into the door next to mine, letting myself in quietly.
I felt my way into the bedroom, hearing soft snores, and crawled into the huge king-sized bed.
“Adam?” a sleepy voice murmured.
I burrowed into the thick comforter and huddled against the warmth behind me. “Yeah, David, it’s me,” I whispered back.
David shifted and wrapped an arm around my waist, burying his face into my back. “No more bad dreams tonight,” he said, sighing lightly before his breathing evened out again.
I hoped he was right.
When I woke up, David wasn’t there. I picked the robe up off the ground, shrugged it on, and walked out of the bedroom to find him perched on the couch flipping through the TV channels with a bowl of cereal in his hand. I sat down next to him and stole the spoon, taking a bite and smiling as he pretended to swipe at it.
“Morning, babe,” he said, his accent garbled by the mouthful of cereal. He pressed his lips against my temple distractedly as he paused on Jerry Springer.
“No koala for breakfast?” I joked, stretching out languidly. I put my feet up on the coffee table and crossed them at the ankles.
David smirked, turning his attention back to his cereal as the show went to commercials. “No, I decided to try being American for once,” he answered, running a hand through dirty blonde hair. I laughed as the defiant locks barely moved, preferring to stand upright. “I’ll never get my visa renewed if they knew I wasn’t trying to change my ways.”
I laughed and took another bite of his cereal, ducking away from his swatting hand. “What’re you up to today?” I asked, catching a drop of milk at the corner of my mouth before it dribbled down my chin.
David shrugged. “I guess I should go in and do a few hours of research,” he mused, picking at the stubble on his chin.
I wrinkled my nose in disgust. David was a huge nerd about all things physics-related, whereas I hated it—all the equations and symbols really tripped me up. He happened to love it enough to continue working in research labs at UVa over summer break.
“How about we go to a movie after I get back?”
I shrugged. “We can do that,” I said. “I don’t work tonight at your favorite restaurant,” I teased, poking him in the side. I got a job waiting tables at Outback Steakhouse soon after I met David, and finding out he was Australian, not British like I’d originally thought, made teasing him that much easier.
David turned to face me. “I meant, let’s go on a date,” he said, watching me closely.
I felt like a jolt of electricity hit me. I shook my head. “No. No way. I’m not ready to go public,” I said, my mouth going dry. “I’m sorry. We can go, but I’m not doing the handholding stuff or anything like that.”
David sighed, then nodded and turned back to the television.
“I’m sorry,” I said again after an awkward silence.
David gave me a small smile. “I know it’s going to take you a while,” he said. “But I’d be lying if I said I am waiting patiently.”
I took his hand and laced my fingers through his, unsure of what to say. Was there even a right thing to say? I couldn’t think of anything, so I stayed quiet and watched people on Jerry Springer scream at each other over infidelities instead.
After the show was over, David decided to get dressed, so I went back to my apartment and showered. I wrung water out of my dreadlocks, rolling them between my palms to keep them tight.
Two hours later, my apartment was as close to spotless as it would ever get. Bored, I decided to drive to the university and pick up my textbooks a little early—it gave me a better chance at getting the used books, plus I could read the first chapters and be a little prepared for the first day of lecture.
I grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge and walked down the stairs to my beat-up white Civic, shielding my eyes from the bright sun. I fiddled with the knob on the radio, trying to find Charlottesville’s rock station, and drove down the street hoping I didn’t have a brain-dead moment and make a wrong turn somewhere.
After picking up my books and a campus map, I found the bright orange box depicting the physics building and decided to surprise David. Since I had registered to take college physics the upcoming semester, I needed to figure out where my class would be, anyway.
I peered at the brightly colored map and frowned. According to the map, the bookstore was relatively close to the physics building, so I started walking toward the cluster of engineering buildings I could see in the distance. If I was reading the map right, the physics building was just behind that cluster.
I reached the building and walked inside, scanning a directory for a familiar name. I thought David had mentioned the name Gallagher, so I found that name on the plaque and walked toward the listed physics lab.
“104, 105, 106…” I muttered to myself as I strolled through the hallway, stopping occasionally to check out posters tacked on the walls detailing someone’s research. Half the words didn’t make any sense to me, but the diagrams and graphs looked interesting once I ignored the weird-looking equations. I looked up from one detailing something called molecular orbital energy splitting and saw I was nearly in front of the lab I had been looking for.
Tentatively, I knocked on the heavy-looking wooden door and took a step back, tugging on my shirt. Maybe this was a bad idea. He was probably busy or talking to someone.
I slapped a hand to my forehead—of course he wouldn’t be here alone; why didn’t I think about that? Either I was going to interrupt something, or we’d be in an awkward situation.
I turned to leave just as an older man wearing khakis and a button-up shirt opened the door.
“Can I help you?”
I shifted. “I was just—“
“Adam! What are you doing here?” David asked, catching my eye as he walked past the open door. He pulled off a pair of goggles and smiled widely at me, nodding at the man.
I shrugged. “I was bored, and figured I’d pick up my books,” I answered, a slow smile overtaking my face. I fought to keep it from becoming a full-blown cheesy grin—I didn’t want to risk being too flamboyant or anything, since I didn’t know if David’s lab partners knew he was… different.
The older man walked back into the lab and David held the door open, letting me into an office-like area with three desks and a bookcase. Papers were strewn about on all three desks, filled with weird symbols and strange words. I gave up trying to peek at the papers and sat down on a ratty office chair David offered.
“Don’t worry about Jenkins,” he said, gesturing into the lab. “The bloke’s our PhD student, so he’s here all the time stressing about one thing or another, especially now that we’re getting close to figuring out how the autoionization of atoms with optically active electrons affect the energy fields surrounding them. Sure, the chemists will probably end up using that information more than we will, but atomic physics is still pretty interesting.”
Bewildered, I shook my head slowly. “I think I’ll stick to music composition, thanks—figuring out the bridge to ‘Falling Away’ on my guitar sounds a lot more doable.”
I nodded, absently twirling one dread around my finger and looking around the room. “I’m not interrupting anything, am I? Because I can leave if I am,” I said, starting to get up.
“No, no, you’re fine, Adam. Actually, I was just getting ready to leave. Jenkins was whinging about someone else in the lab leaving something on all night and doesn’t want to watch over us ankle-biters,” he said, shrugging and giving the entrance to the lab an exasperated look. “I’d rather get out of here than tiptoe on eggshells and have him go mental because I was breathing too loudly or some shit.”
I stood up and waited for David to put his goggles away, following behind him as he walked out of the lab.
“Which car park are you in?” he asked, turning around to look at me as we stepped out of the building into the hot sun.
I pointed in the bookstore’s general direction after a moment of confusion. “The parking lot is over there,” I said, grinning at him. “You and your strange Aussie-speak.”
He raised an eyebrow humorously, setting off at a leisurely pace toward the bookstore. “Me? What about you crazy Americans? I was filling out a form for the physics department last week and screwed up the date. I asked Jenna, one of the other undergrad researchers, for a rubber, and the girl freaked on me!” he exclaimed, his hands moving wildly as he spoke. “She thought I was trying to sleep with her or some shit—I just wanted to erase my mistake!”
I choked on the sip of water I’d just taken, managing to keep from spitting it everywhere. “Really? And you’ve been here two years? You can’t tell me you hadn’t heard a condom referred to as a rubber before then,” I chuckled, screwing the cap back onto the bottle.
“Crazy Americans—do you realize a large part of your slang is sex-related? Honestly,” he said, squinting slightly as we got closer to the bookstore. “I’m in the next lot—I’ll walk with you anyway.”
I gave him a small smile, fiddling with my water bottle. I fished for my keys in my pocket, looking over the grassy area in front of the bookstore. A small crowd of people were following a girl who was talking loudly and walking backwards—they most likely were touring the school.
David’s cold fingers wrapped around my upper arm, making me stop in my tracks. I turned to ask him what was wrong and started—his face was so close I could count the few light brown flecks in his mostly-green eyes. The chatter of the crowd seemed to swell into a dull roar and the buzzing of the bees in the nearby flowerbeds turned almost sinister.
His lips touched mine and a bolt of lightning shot through me as my mind jumped into overdrive. I could almost feel hundreds of accusing, hateful stares drilling into my back. The feeling only intensified and, after what felt like ages, my lead arms finally responded and shoved David back.
My heart was beating wildly against my chest, as if it was trying to escape the confines of my ribcage. I looked behind me, meeting the eyes of a few people who looked away quickly. Goosebumps prickled along my arms.
I couldn’t think of anything to say to David, who was just standing there with a slightly hurt expression on his face, so I turned away from him and marched to my car, my keys in my hand.
“Adam, wait,” David said, putting a hand on my shoulder as I shoved my key into the door and wrenched it open. My hands were shaking. I realized I’d dropped the water bottle at some point without meaning to.
“How could you do that, David? How could you kiss me in front of all those people, knowing what I went through in New Mexico?” I demanded, my knuckles turning white as I gripped the doorframe of the old Civic.
“This isn’t New Mexico, Adam! No one here really cares! For Chrissake’s, there’s a gay bar in the city, they have gay pride events… I don’t understand. How much more evidence do you need before you believe that no one’s going to hurt you here?” David tried to grip my shoulder. I flinched, and he put his hand down.
The air seemed thin—I couldn’t get enough of it in my lungs, and it made my head spin. “You can’t expect me to be comfortable with being out overnight, David!”
“It’s been a year, Adam. I have been extremely patient with you—do you remember the way that you used to be when you first got here? You couldn’t even admit to yourself that you were gay. I have been patient, Adam, so don’t accuse me of pushing too hard,” David hissed, eyeing a girl getting out of her car nearby.
“Oh, right, because kissing me in public isn’t pushing too hard,” I scoffed.
David’s lips thinned. “What else am I supposed to do—pretend having a secret relationship is fun? I can’t even flirt with you at your music showcases without you panicking—you shoot me down every time. Did you really think that I’d put up with that forever?” His eyes seemed to have lost their shine. His shoulders slumped suddenly, making him seem smaller. He tried again to put a hand on my shoulder, but again I flinched away. David looked at me as though he was seeing me for the first time.
“What?” I demanded, wishing he’d quit staring at me like that. I wanted to go home. I looked around, feeling eyes boring holes into me, but saw nothing.
“You’re not just afraid. You’re ashamed,” he said, his eyes wide. “I don’t know if you’re more ashamed of yourself or of me, but I can’t do this.” David sighed and ran a hand through his hair, gripping it tightly for a second before facing me again, a pained expression on his face.
My throat felt like it had closed up. Someone threw a bucket of ice in my stomach—that or removed it. I didn’t know which. The cold feeling in the pit of my stomach spread, and still I couldn’t find the words to say to David—I wanted him to stop talking. I didn’t want him to say what I thought he was going to say.
“I’m so sorry, Adam,” David sighed. “I can’t be with you if you won’t fully accept who you are. I can’t have a part-time boyfriend. It’s all or nothing now. I’m sorry.” His shoulders slumped and he shoved his hands into his pockets.
I couldn’t do anything but watch as he left.
I didn’t remember getting home. I just realized the apartment was dark and my keys were still in my hand. I wondered briefly if I had moved much once I’d gotten home—my full bladder and growling, empty stomach gave me reason to believe I hadn’t.
I flipped the bathroom light on and looked at my watch—it was nearly eight. I should have been at the movies with David, not sitting in the dark all alone.
The toilet gurgled loudly as it emptied, and I rubbed my hands together briskly under a stream of warm water. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. Somehow I felt I’d have a haunted expression mirroring the one David had given me hours before, and I didn’t think I could handle seeing it right then.
I didn’t want to admit to myself that I might have just lost my first boyfriend.
I barely slept that night. It seemed like every time I closed my eyes, I saw David’s disappointed face or I had the old nightmare, only this time it felt like I was watching behind a pane of glass. I finally gave up trying to sleep around four, thankful I didn’t work that day either.
I was so used to going to David’s and crawling into his bed when I couldn’t sleep, but I doubted I’d be welcome after what had happened the day before. Instead, I made an extra-rich, extra hot cup of Swiss Miss and sat on the couch, trying to find something besides infomercials to watch.
While Billy Mays shouted excitedly about Oxyclean, I finally fell asleep again. This time in my nightmare, I watched myself being beaten up instead of experiencing it firsthand.
I woke up when a ray of sunlight hit my eyes, blinding me. I swung my legs off the couch, narrowly missing the coffee table my cold half-filled cup of Swiss Miss rested on. I cradled my head in my heads, wincing as a shorter dread swung forward and thumped against my eye.
Maybe I could still fix this. Maybe I could get David to talk to me, to give me a little more time to adjust to being gay, if I said something first. I could invite him somewhere—to the movies, round two. I did really want to see V for Vendetta, and if asking him to come with me instead waiting for him to ask wasn’t the first step to being comfortable with myself, I didn’t know what was.
I showered and dressed, making sure to wear the small black shirt David said was his favorite of mine and knot the grown-out roots of my hair. I checked my appearance and smiled—hopefully, this would help me get David to agree to a movie.
“First, the trash,” I muttered, pulling the full Glad bag out of the canister and knotting it. I put my keys in my jeans pocket and stepped outside, holding the smelly bag away from me.
As I walked back to my apartment, I caught sight of David’s door closing.
I felt shaky inside. I had no idea what to say, what David needed to hear, but I had to do something. I rapped on his door lightly, hoping he didn’t refuse to see me.
David opened the door and looked at me warily. There were bags under his eyes I’d never seen before.
“Can we talk?” I asked.
David stepped back, opening the door a little wider, and I walked inside. I took a seat on the couch, and David sat at the other end. He looked at me expectantly.
“I’m sorry.” I mentally whacked myself—I had said that before. What was the difference in saying it now?
Judging by David’s raised eyebrows, he was thinking the same thing.
“I panicked. There were people there that could see, and I freaked when I shouldn’t have. I trust you, and I know that you wouldn’t kiss me in public if you thought we could be harrassed for it. I just… I’ve spent so long hiding who I am that it’s hard to change now. I wish I wasn’t paranoid about this, but I am. I will work on it, but it’s going to take time.” I watched his face carefully, feeling a bit of hope when David’s expression softened slightly.
“I can’t wait forever, Adam,” David said, moving a little closer to me. “I hate to push you, but you have to try harder. Your fear won’t go away if you ignore the problem altogether.”
I sighed and nodded. “I know, and I will work on it. I swear,” I said, taking his hand in mine. I leaned forward and brushed my lips against his, secretly thrilled when he didn’t pull away.
“Good,” he said, looking at me almost suspiciously.
I shrugged it off—I couldn’t really blame him for doubting me. “So, um, I have tonight off. Want to go see that movie?” I asked.
“Which did you have in mind?” David asked, pulling his hand away to adjust his lopsided jacket.
“V for Vendetta,” I answered, wondering if I could take his hand again. I decided not to. “I looked up the movie times yesterday, and we can still catch a matinee showing, if you want. I’ll drive,” I offered.
Neither of us said much on the way there. I wondered briefly, with a sharp pang, if David was giving me one last pity date before deciding I was too broken for him. He didn’t say much, didn’t really respond when I kissed him… Maybe he was just unsure I’d come through with my end of the bargain. Maybe he was just protecting himself. I didn’t know, but I hoped those were the only reasons for his odd behavior.
The movie theater parking lot was strangely full for a weekday matinee showing. Once I parked the car, David got out and walked ahead of me to the ticket booth, confirming my suspicions that he didn’t quite consider us as “back together” just yet.
I hurried to catch up to David, keenly aware that the tight-fitting shirt I had on was probably enough to set off someone’s “gaydar.” I fought against the bubble of panic threatening to rise up, reminding myself that Charlottesville wasn’t Las Cruces. The people were different here. They didn’t care.
I took a deep breath. I knew I didn’t want to lose David, and I knew that the only way he’d believe me was to show him I’d try.
I caught up to David, catching his hand with mine and interlacing our fingers as we got in the ticket line.
I smiled at the hopeful expression on his face, squeezing his hand slightly. The paranoid side of me told me it was enough that I’d taken the first step, that I could let go now before anyone saw us and my secret would be safe.
I didn’t let go.
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